Former US Ambassador to Russia Tells MSNBC Putin Speech Revealed He’s Scared of Wagner: Putin Is Doing ‘Very Delicate Dance’
Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul told MSNBC that Vladimir Putin is scared of Yevgeny Prigozhin and the Wagner mercenaries, otherwise he wouldn’t have given Monday’s televised address.
McFaul said he listened to Putin’s five-minute speech in Russian instead of relying on a translation.
“I think it’s very clear what he’s trying to do,” McFaul said of Putin’s plan. “Everybody thought it was going to be something dramatic because [Putin’s press secretary] Peskov thought it was — He is trying to divide the Wagner mercenaries, the soldiers, from their leadership. He’s actually trying to do exactly what Prigozhin was trying to do with the Russian conventional forces, saying, ‘You’ve been lied to by them. They’ve dragged you into this war.'”
“That’s my interpretation of the speech; what I think is behind it, is that they must have signaled that they’re not lying down their forces, just as you were just reporting, right? Prigozhin said only a couple percent did that, and so I think Putin is afraid of them, and he’s trying to put some division saying they were deceived to try to do this mutiny; ‘join us, and let’s throw your commanders under the bus.'”
McFaul said there was no other reason for Putin to give that speech other than “he was fearful of them.”
“If everything was going swimmingly and they’re all signing up for contracts with the armed forces and laying down their guns and just go along, he wouldn’t have to give this speech,” McFaul said.
“He just can’t arrest them all and say they’re all traitors,” McFaul said of Putin’s Wagner dilemma. “Because to many Russians, and including, I think, Russian soldiers, they are heroes, because they fought so valiantly in Bakhmut. And so he’s trying to do this very delicate dance of saying, ‘You guys are OK, it’s your leaders that are at fault.’ And now we’ll have to wait and see how those soldiers respond.”
Watch the clip above via MSNBC.
